Talmage Newman Cooley (born 1965 in Charlottesville, Virginia) is an American filmmaker and gun violence advocate Through his production company Kinoglaz Pictures, he is the writer/director of award-winning narrative and documentary films featured at Sundance and over 100 festivals worldwide, as well as numerous PSA spots for social justice organizations.
In the mid to late 1990s, Cooley directed television PSA's for prominent social impact organizations such as the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, The Creative Coalition and the Partnership for a Drug Free America.
[5] Through this work, he began researching how large-scale social messaging efforts could successfully shift cultural norms and launch grassroots movements.
This work led to the 2013 launch of Democracy.com,[6] an online platform for civic engagement that "empowers every citizen to take action on the issues and elections they care about in under 60 seconds".
The Gun Violence Project's website (www.askaboutguns.org) lists a number of well-known entertainment figures, reflecting the organization's focus on leveraging popular culture to promote Asking Saves Kids.
By 2000, PAX had become the largest non-lobbying organization working on the US gun violence issue as a result of the success and rapid expansion of its ASK[7] and SPEAK UP campaigns.
[9] The SPEAK UP program created a national hotline for young people to anonymously report weapon related threats in their schools and neighborhoods, and received over 40,000 calls since inception.
This innovative, non-partisan approach to gun violence prevention represented a stark contrast to the politics-based framing which had dominated the issue for many years without significant success.
The report, entitled "Personal Firearms: Programs that Promote Safe Storage and Research on their Effectiveness," was prepared over a two-year period in response to a request by the Congressional HELP (Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions) Committee.
[14] The report evaluated 16 programs, both regional and national, that are aimed at spreading awareness of the importance of reducing gun violence against children and families.
In 2005, Cooley directed a short documentary, Dimmer,[21][22] about a gang of blind teenagers who roam the streets of the bleak industrial neighborhoods of Buffalo, New York.